{
 "id": "james-mcintyre/advice-to-a-little-girl",
 "title": "Advice to a Little Girl",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "James McIntyre",
 "poet_slug": "james-mcintyre",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames",
 "book_slug": "musings-on-the-banks-of-canadian-thames",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1884,
  "venue": "Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames (1884)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/james-mcintyre_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36068",
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_11791"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 30,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 50,
  "max_indent": 4
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Dressing in fashion will be called vain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And they’ll call you a dowdy if you are plain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But do what is right, let that be the test,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then proudly hold up your head with the best.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For people will talk.",
    "indent": 4
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You will never be wrong if you do what is right,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And this course pursue with all of your might,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And if you’re a child going to school,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or full grown up take this for your rule.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For people will talk.",
    "indent": 4
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The best way to do is to let them rave",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And they’ll think more of you if you are brave,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For no one will ever think you are rude",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If you are determined for to be good.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For people will talk.",
    "indent": 4
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Little girl on her way to Sunday School class,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Rude boys sometimes will not let her pass,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But if they see she is not afraid",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They soon will respect the brave little maid.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For people will talk.",
    "indent": 4
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Little girls should learn to knit and to sew,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Then if to womanhood they ever grow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their hose they can knit and make their own dress,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And pathway of life for others they bless.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For people will talk.",
    "indent": 4
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And their homes they should make tidy and neat,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Everything should be so clean and so sweet,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This line for ourselves out we will chalk",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And we are determined in it to walk.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For people will talk.",
    "indent": 4
   }
  ]
 ]
}